BETTER USE OF VET HOUSING FUNDS?

State legislation to ask voters to loosen restrictions on use of bond revenues

Amount to be directed toward multiple-family housing and services for veterans, in legislation proposed by Assembly Speaker John Pérez

Sacramento

California has the authority to tap more than $1 billion to help veterans buy single-family homes even as thousands of those who served their country live on the streets because of a shortage of affordable apartments.

This dichotomy is the product of a mix of developments. Among those: voter-approved restrictions on selling bonds for housing veterans, the recession and the wind-down of conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan that has greatly increased the number of returning troops in need of a place to stay.

California lawmakers are convinced they have come up with a relatively simple strategy to help ease the housing crisis confronting veterans — as long as voters agree.

Assembly Speaker John Pérez is carrying legislation that would ask voters for permission to spend $600 million in pre-approved bond revenues on multiple-family housing and services for veterans instead of being restricted to loans for homes and farms.

“This legislation gives Californians the chance to make sure that the people who served in our military, who have sacrificed for their country, will not have to worry about where they and their family will sleep,” said Perez, D-Los Angeles.

The measure has put a spotlight on an underutilized farm and home loan program run by the California Department of Veterans Affairs since 1921.

Voters in 2000 and 2008 approved separate housing bonds for veterans. But the California Department of Veterans Affairs has not sold a dime of the $1 billion in bonds authorized in 2008 and still has $230 million left over from the $500 million measure passed in 2000.

Currently, the department has $100 million cash on hand to lend without going back to the bond market.

If the proposed change becomes law, the department would still control about $500 million in bonding authority for the traditional home loan program. How long that will last depends on market conditions and demand, said Theresa Gunn, deputy secretary of the department’s farm and home purchases division.

“I would say for three years we’re going to be OK in making loans,” Gunn said.

The department has not taken a position on the bill.

The veterans department and two other state housing agencies would administer the new funding program, under Assembly Bill 639.

“This will let us use the money where it is needed the most,” Pérez said.

The legislation has drawn the support of the Veterans Village of San Diego.

“While the voter-passed initiative (in 2008) failed to help a single veteran buy a home, AB 639 would generate thousands of affordable and supportive apartments,” President Phil Landis told lawmakers in a letter.

California has the largest number of veterans and homeless veterans of any state. There are nearly 2 million living here, of whom 16,461 do not have a permanent residence, according to government estimates. There are an estimated 1,486 homeless veterans in San Diego County.

San Diego County this weekend held its annual Stand Down event to help homeless veterans.